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Let me add my own accolades to a group of young Orthodox Jewish campers in the Catskills. Matzav published a Facebook post by Ann-Marie Barton that clearly indicates these campers have made a major Kiddush HaShem by their behavior. That Kiddush HaShem has been enhanced by a follow-up video by Ann-Marie.
Ann-Marie is a non Jewish bus driver who was very impressed by these young students. They behaved the way all Bnei Torah should behave and deserve to be recognized for that. I can’t say this for a certainty, but based on the demographics in the Catskills this time of year, I think it is safe to say that these boys were all Charedi. This is one of those instances about which I can say I am proud to be an observant Jew.
How nice it is to report good news for a change. But that is exactly the problem, isn’t it? Why must this be a ‘man bites dog’ story? Why is it news that young people behaved the way they were supposed to? Why is this story not a ‘dog bites man’ story – something that is so ordinary that it isn’t worth reporting?
I think we all know the answer to that. It is because of the negative attitude expressed about the ‘outside world’ that is so common in communities like this. An attitude picked up by children who then end up treating those outsiders with contempt! (Parents are their natural role models.)
I am reminded of Rav who is an old friend of mine and was a general studies principal of a Charedi Yeshiva high school. He told me many years ago about what can only be the opposite of a Kiddush HaShem.
While the students in that Yeshiva had great reverence for their Roshei Yeshiva and Rebbeim, they had no respect at all for their secular studies teachers. Often mocking them to their faces. When he confronted these students about their terrible Chilul HaShem - one of them gave a response that was shocking. It went something like this. ‘M’stam They were Oiver on at least one of the Sheva Mitzvos Bnei Noach and are M’chuyiv Misah anyway. No?’
With that comment he and his friends made themselves Judge, Jury, and Executioner… giving them ‘license’ to behave like pigs. Lest anyone think that was an anomaly, I have seen this kind of attitude expressed many times about ‘Goyim’. ‘Esav Sonei L’Yaakov’ they will say. They hate us anyway, so why bother being nice?!
Not to mention the fact that a while back I actually heard a recording by some minor Chasidic Rebbe telling listeners that although we have to be nice to Goyim because we need to get along in society, we must HATE them in our hearts. (He emphasized the word hate.)
Is it any wonder then that this Kiddush HaShem is newsworthy? If the message about the non Jewish world is so negative, what should we expect from our own children?
To be fair this event was also reported to contrast it with the antisemitism that has reared its ugly head in some New York and New Jersey locations. Locations where there are lots of Charedi residents.
One can quibble about what the cause of that antisemitism is, but it is pretty clear that it exists – albeit somewhat thinly disguised. This event was an effort to broadcast to the world an image that is the opposite of the negative stereotype often erroneously projected about Orthodox Jews.
But at the same time it cannot be denied that far too many of us harbor our own bigotry towards ‘the Goyim’. A lot of it being generationally transmitted via parents and ancestors that lived in societies that were truly antisemitic. Where pogroms were common. And where we were so severely restricted to location and jobs that many of our ancestors has to have an underground ‘black market’ economy just to survive.
That attitude has survived to this day among many of us despite the fact that the vast majority of non Jews do not harbor any hate or resentment toward us. Most non Jews in America are more like Ann-Marie. Not like the antisemites who want to keep Charedim out of their neighborhoods. (It should also be noted that some of those ‘antisemites’ might even be Jews. Anti religious secular ones that are embarrassed by those ‘old fashioned funny looking Jews’.)
I hate to ‘spoil the party’ by bringing all of this up instead of just letting a Kiddush HaShem be a Kiddush HaShem. I am happy to see that there are some parents that are doing something to change how the rest of the world sees us. But is this the new norm? Or is it an anomaly?
If we are ever going to make this kind Kiddush HaShem the norm instead of the exception that makes it newsworthy, we are going to have to change our attitude completely and realize that it is not ‘the Goyim’ that is the enemy. It is us. We are our own worst enemy if we continue to preach hatred of the outside world in a country that has been nothing but good to us.